Some Definitions (New Haven, 2006-present)

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Some Definitions

(New Haven, 2006-present)

What is a hyperromance?

In Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, one of
the few books I still own (and only because I left it in Norman
Mailer’s car during my brief, disastrous stay with Suzanne, and
never carried it up to her apartment, because it was so heavy), I find
the following under romance (n.):

1a. a tale in verse written in medieval times based
chiefly on legend, chivalric love and adventure;

1b. a prose tale written in medieval times and resembling
a metrical romance;

1c. a prose narrative having romantic qualities or characteristics:
as (1): one treating imaginary characters involved in events unrelated
to everyday life—compare FANTASY FICTION (2): one dealing with
the remote in time or place, the heroic, the adventurous, and often the
mysterious—compare the HISTORICAL NOVEL;

2. something (as an extravagant invention or wild exaggeration)
that lacks basis or foundation in fact;

Each of these definitions, I’m sorry to say, has its place here.
There is a tale of love in verse, and prosaic adventures as well; there
are stories
unrelated to life and stories all too closely related to it. There
is certainly much that lacks a basis in fact. The whole is wildly romantic
in its hopes and in its discouragement also. It is, furthermore, Romantic,
in that it treats of mountains and nature and time, the bignesses in which
the human spirit hopes to lose itself. There is a love in it: many loves:
too many loves. And also a language derived from Latin by way of French:
langue d’up. You will not have heard of it. But be patient:
you will.

As for hyper: haven’t you guessed? There is too much of
everything here, far too much of everything. There is hypertext
written in a state of hyperactivity, not to mention hyperbole,
and Hyperboria. And hypercriticism, if you choose, and
hypersensitivity, whether you like it or not.